c. 2000 Religion News Service
Elian’s Grandmothers Press Case for His Return to Cuba
(RNS) As the grandmothers of 6-year-old Elian Gonzalez pressed their case with members of Congress for their”ultimate goal”of the boy’s return to Cuba, the Immigration and Naturalization Service on Tuesday (Jan. 25) ordered a meeting between Elian and his grandmothers.
The INS said the meeting would take place Wednesday at a”neutral site”_ the home of Sister Jeanne O’Laughlin, president of Barry University, a Roman Catholic school in Miami Shores, Fla.
The order follows an unsuccessful attempt by the grandmothers to see the boy on Monday.
Supported by the National Council of Churches, Elian’s maternal grandmother, Raquel Rodriquez, and paternal grandmother, Mariela Quintana, began their trip when they flew to the United States last Friday to both meet with Elian and urge that he be returned to his father in Cuba.
NCC spokeswoman Carol Fouke said the grandmothers spent Tuesday visiting members of Congress on Capitol Hill to make their case both for the visit and for his return to Cuba.”The grandmothers are still pursuing the goal of a visit with Elian in a safe neutral place anywhere,”Fouke said.
On Monday, in an effort to forestall Elian’s return to Cuba, Sen. Connie Mack, R-Fla., introducted legislation to provide the Cuban boy with U.S. citizenship.”The purpose of the bill is to move the decision-making about the little boy’s future out of the hands of the INS,”Mack said.
He said he hopes the legislation _ which he says would not prevent the 6-year-old from being returned to Cuba _ could be considered as soon as Wednesday.
The legislation, Mack said, would take the INS _ which he described as”a federal agency that is subject to political pressure”_ out of the decision-making process and allow a state court to make a ruling.
The INS ordered that Elian should be returned to Cuba, but the boy’s Miami relatives have challenged that decision in court.”If the court should decide that they believe that it’s in the boy’s best interest that he goes back to Cuba, as a citizen he would have the option at some point in the future of coming back to America,”Mack said.
High Court Clears Way for Trial of Adventist Pastor Accused of Genocide
(RNS) The U.S. Supreme Court has rejected the appeal of an elderly Seventh-day Adventist Church pastor from Rwanda seeking to block his extradition to stand trial before a United Nations war crimes tribunal.
The court, acting without comment on Monday (Jan. 24), cleared the way for the Rev. Elizaphan Ntakirutimana, 75, to be handed over to the U.N. tribunal.
Secretary of State Madeleine Albright, who earlier had argued that Ntakirutimana be handed over to the tribunal, now will review whatever humanitarian claims the cleric may raise before making a final decision on the case, Reuters reported.
U.N. prosecutors allege that Ntakirutimana joined convoys of armed soldiers and civilians who repeatedly searched for and attacked ethnic minority Tutsis during the savage 1994 genocide in Rwanda during which more than a half-million people, mainly Tutsis, were killed and that he took part in the killings. According to the charges, this included survivors who had sought refuge in his church and hospital compound.
The U.N. tribunal charged the pastor with genocide in June 1996 and he was arrested three months later in Laredo, Texas, where he was living with one of his sons.
Pope Sees Media”Indifference, Even Hostility”Toward Christian Message
(RNS) Pope John Paul II has accused the secular communications media of”indifference, even hostility”to the message of Christianity and called on those responsible to examine their consciences.
The Roman Catholic pontiff leveled the charge in his message for the 34th World Communications Day, which the church will celebrate June 4 on the theme of”Proclaiming Christ in the Media at the Dawn of the New Millennium.” Mixed with the criticism, John Paul also praised the media for contributing”to spiritual enrichment in many ways,”such as carrying special programs to worldwide audiences through satellite telecasts.
Archbishop John P. Foley, the American president of the Pontifical Council for Social Communications, told a Vatican news conference on the papal message that more than 2 billion people in at least 60 countries watched the pope open the Holy Door of St. Peter’s Basilica and celebrate Mass on Christmas Eve.
Foley said the television audience was certainly”the most numerous for a religious event in the history of the world.” But the pope said the media were not always so friendly to the Christian message.”In other cases, however, they display the indifference, even hostility, to Christ and his message that exist in certain sectors of secular culture,”he said.”Often there is a need for a kind of `examination of conscience’ on the part of the media, leading to a more critical awareness of a bias or a lack of respect for people’s religious and moral convictions.” The pope underlined the importance to the church of both the Catholic and the secular communication media.”The impact of the media in today’s world can hardly be exaggerated,”he said.”The advent of the information society is a real cultural revolution. “The church must make energetic and skillful use of her own communication _ books, newspapers and periodicals, radio, television and other means,”John Paul said.”And Catholic communicators must be bold and creative in developing new media and methods of proclamation.”But,”he added,”as much as possible, the church also must use the opportunities that are to be found in the secular media.” Church of England Considers Plan for Remarriage of Divorced People
(RNS) Church of England officials have put forward a proposal to allow the marriage within the denomination of divorced people whose previous partners are still alive.
But before the change can take effect it will need two-thirds majorities in all three of the church’s general synod’s houses of bishops, clergy and laity if it is to become law.
The proposal was contained in a report published Tuesday (Jan. 25) and will first be discussed by the church’s 44 dioceses before the bishops put any detailed plans for legislation before the synod _ the end of 2001 at the earliest.
Officially the Church of England does not allow the remarriage in church of a divorced person whose previous spouse is still alive. In practice, however, divorce and remarriage does not mean exclusion from Holy Communion and since the 1970s, and especially since 1985 in the wake of the failure of an earlier attempt to allow church marriages for divorced communicants, increasing use has been made of a service of blessing following a civil marriage for divorced members.
In England a church wedding has full civil validity and in fact from 1753 until 1836 was the only form of marriage available for everyone except Jews and Quakers.
In addition, clergy of the Church of England are legally entitled to conduct the marriages of divorced people, even though the church may officially disapprove.
The proposals put forward by a working party chaired by Bishop Michael Scott-Joynt of Winchester would give Anglican parish priests the discretion to conduct the marriage of divorced persons after referral to their diocesan bishop.
They would need to take into account a number of pastoral criteria, including whether the loose ends left by the previous marriage had been properly tied up and whether the relationship between the couple now wanting to get married was”a direct cause”of the breakdown of the previous marriage.
In addition, priests are to consider whether the new marriage could give rise to hostile public comment or scandal, and neither party should normally have been married and divorced more than once.
The question now is whether the proposals will receive a welcome from the dioceses and whether any legislation put before the general synod will receive the two-thirds majorities.
Quote of the Day: Cardinal Roger Mahony of Los Angeles
(RNS)”… I would like to suggest first that authentic unity in Christ requires sincere repentance _ on the part of one and all _ for the pain each of our communities has inflicted upon one another. We cannot permit ourselves to take the facile and ultimately unsatisfying route of ignoring suffering. The pain is quite real and the process of healing can only begin if we `name’ the sources of pain honestly in a spirit of remorse. Our journey toward deeper unity begins with the step of repentance and, where necessary, restitution, even if that is simply the restoration, first within our congregations, of the good name of other groups of Christians.” _ Roman Catholic Cardinal Roger Mahony of Los Angeles in a Jan. 23 homily at First African Methodist Episcopal Church in Los Angeles marking the Week of Prayer for Christian Unity.
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